The Silver Project/Transcript

WORK IN PROGRESS; NEEDS HUMAN REVIEW

"go! Go! Go!"

not "where? Where? Where?"

it's not smart or correct,

but it's one of the things

that makes us what we are.

[ horns honking ]

[ jazz music plays ]

[ geese honking ]

[ ducks quacking ]

[ water splashes ]

on today's show,

I'm gonna turn a car

into a portable drive-in movie,

dalton humphries

is gonna show you

how to add value

to a precious heirloom,

bill's called out at the plate,

and harold finds out

what happens

when you turn your back

on a relative.

And now here's the man

who's all bark,

even though

he's out of his tree,

my uncle, red green!

Thank you very much,

and please welcome the guy

we refer to as "free to

good home," my nephew, harold.

[ torch whooshing ]

scary stuff.

Been excitement this week

at the lodge.

Buster hadfield and his wife

just got back from a trip

where they drove

all over the country.

Wow. Really?

I just thought they were gonna

go visit their relatives,

like, a couple hundred miles

from here in port asbestos.

Yeah, well,

that was the plan,

but, you know,

buster hates to pull over

and ask for directions

when he gets lost.

Wa-a-a! So he drove

all over the continent instead?

Wa-a-a!

Well, I don't --

I don't blame him, harold.

It's embarrassing,

you know,

to look like you don't know

where you're going.

You don't want people thinking

you're an idiot.

Especially

when they're right.

Wa-a-a.

Well, the good thing was he

could drive pretty much nonstop,

because with his wife

yelling at him like that,

he doesn't have to worry about

falling asleep at the wheel.

Oh, his poor wife.

That makes for a long time

when you're sitting

beside somebody going,

"I know what I'm doing!"

without any proof.

Yeah. It's like having you

as a producer/director.

So, the one time they pulled

over for gas, she went in,

bought a camera

so she could take pictures

that they could use

at the divorce trial,

but by the time they got home,

of course, all is forgiven.

Now they've invited

the whole bunch of us

to come over to their place

and see their pictures.

Oh. Well, ha. Okay.

Uh, I got so much to do,

I can't go.

You know,

I got to clean my glasses,

floss my teeth, you know.

Well, that's great,

'cause if you're not going,

I'll be able to go.

Oh, okay. Make sure you get

directions before you leave.

It'd be really hard

to do the show from mexico.

Wa-a-a!

You're watching

"the red green show."

one man's junk

is another man's treasure.

[ pulley squeaking ]

[ guitar playing ]

♪ well, if you're asked

on a picnic ♪

♪ and you can't refuse ♪

♪ be extra careful

in the sandwich you choose ♪

♪ ham is okay,

unless it's green and wet ♪

♪ egg is dicey,

and sardine is a threat ♪

♪ if you're in doubt,

don't take a chance ♪

♪ only eat the food

that's covered with ants ♪

♪ if there aren't any on it,

that's an important clue ♪

♪ 'cause if the bugs

won't eat it ♪

♪ then neither should you ♪

today on "meet your member,"

we're talking

to winston rothschild,

who is c.E.O., c.O.O.,

and c-3po

of rothschild sewage

and septic sucking services.

Winston, maybe you

could tell our viewers

how you got to where you are,

wherever that might be.

Well, yeah, thanks, red.

I, uh -- I'm from

about 70 miles from here.

Small, little village --

uh, didn't have a name, eh?

It couldn't afford one.

Really?

And, of course,

I guess your dad

was in the sewage business

before you.

No, no, no, no, no.

No. Uh, dad was

in the railroad there

for most of his life, eh?

He, uh -- you know, he spent

the early years as a coal man.

Oh, yeah.

And, uh, then he, uh --

I don't know what happened.

Three or four years later,

they went to diesel electric,

and so he'd just go into work

and fall asleep in the box car.

That would be a fascinating job,

I would think.

And then, uh, after 30 years,

the railroad fired him, eh?

Just like that,

like he was nothing.

I guess it would be hard for him

to find another job

that he was, you know,

kind of suited for.

[ chuckles ]

you got that right, eh?

And even after

the $500,000 wrongful-dismissal

settlement, eh?

Yeah. I'll never forget,

that very day, he come home

and said,

"winston, three things.

"number one,

start your own business.

"number two,

be your own boss.

"number three,

get off the couch.

I got to take a nap."

well, uh, winston,

I'll tell you, you know,

you've done well for yourself.

I mean, around here, your name

is synonymous with sewage.

[ ducks quacking ]

I'll tell you,

you have never experienced

full-blown terminal boredom

until you sit through

those holiday pictures

taken by buster hadfield,

[ cans clanging ]

or, as we call him,

the accidental tourist.

But I'll tell you,

even if you got great pictures,

like my slides,

you still can't get people

to come over to your house

and look at them.

So, that's why this week

on "handyman corner,"

I thought I'd show you

how to make a portable

projection system,

and I'm not just talking about

a slide projector on wheels.

I'm talking about this.

[ grunting ]

[ crash ]

your very own drive-away

drive-in theater,

'cause drive-ins are fun

and they're romantic,

especially the back seat.

Now, your guests

are gonna sit in here

just like they do at a drive-in,

but with our unit, the screen

is much more interactive

'cause what we're gonna do is

just pop the hood up like this.

We'll mount a screen

on the inside,

and the screen's right there

in their face.

We just open this up.

[ grunts ]

oh.

All right.

Okay. Well, uh, this hood opens

the wrong way.

Nice work, harold.

Don't worry about it.

I'll just take her off,

and we'll mount her properly.

Now, when you remount that,

you can weld on the old hinges

or you can bolt on new hinges

or you could use what I use,

the handyman's secret weapon,

duct tape.

Now it opens the right way.

Thank you just the same, harold.

And we prop that up in there,

and now what we need is

something to use as a screen.

I'm thinking

something clean and white,

maybe one of the lodge sheets.

Something a little cleaner

and whiter than that.

I got an idea.

[ banging ]

door off a fridge.

We'll use that side there.

You know, they say

you're supposed to take the door

off a fridge

before you throw it out anyway,

and we'll have to throw that one

out now for sure.

Okay. So, we got our screen

mounted inside the hood there,

and I've run the power supply

back from the battery,

courtesy of a couple of sets

of jumper cables.

Use as many as you like.

And they're going to power

the slide projector here,

which I'm gonna throw in

up onto the --

the back shelf of the --

of the car,

which is not really good

for anything, anyhow.

Hook those up.

There we go.

Now, to power the whole unit up,

all's we have to do

is start the car.

[ engine turns over ]

[ whoosh! ]

oh, boy!

That's bright, isn't it?

Wow!

Boy, it'll do.

But we've left out the one thing

that teenagers enjoy doing most

at a drive-in --

eating popcorn.

So, all's we got to do is, uh,

take the lid off our jar

of popcorn here

and, uh, turn her upside down

over that hole

that's making all the noise

in the exhaust manifold.

There we go.

Now the, uh, heat of the engine

will pop the popcorn.

[ corn popping ]

there we go.

And she comes out back here.

Of course, what you want to do

is to attach a piece

of flexible piping

so you can channel that popcorn

up into some kind

of a container, like that,

and you can have your various

other treats in here --

your chocolate bars,

your drinks, your what have you.

And there you have your very own

portable drive-in theater

with all the accoutrements.

So, remember, if the women

don't find you handsome,

they should

at least find you handy.

Let's get back

to our slide show.

Oh, boy, oh, boy.

You're gonna love this.

All right.

Now, it's a little out of focus,

I know, but see that guy there?

Forget his name.

He was funny.

[ laughs ]

oh, yeah.

This is a picture of his wife.

Oh, no.

That's the rockies.

Stay tuned.

Harold's gonna call

for my high inside heat,

and I'm gonna talk to you

teenagers

about those darn bicycles

of yours.

I see a lot of you teenagers

are riding bicycles out there,

and I know that's good for

the environment and everything,

but what a pain.

You ride in the middle

of the lane

and come around corners

just like you were a vehicle

or something,

and you're practically

invisible, you know.

What do you weigh, 60 pounds?

And you wear

one of them spandex suits,

wraps your body so tight

you look like a roll bar.

You're risking your lives

out there,

'cause if we get

into a misunderstanding

as to who has the right-of-way,

I'm in a van,

you're in a helmet.

You lose.

Now, I don't want to make

judgments

about how you teenagers

want to kill yourselves,

but I would suggest that you

either grow up and get a car

or ride on the sidewalk,

but not my sidewalk.

That's where I park the van.

[ rattling ]

well, you should have seen

buster hadfield's pictures

from his trip.

Unbelievable.

All taken from inside the car.

Mostly shots

of the rearview mirror,

except

for the california ones.

They were all

sun-visor shots.

Well, maybe the camera

was too complicated for him.

Oh, you got that right,

harold.

He had 60 pictures

of the inside of the lens cap.

All of them out of focus.

And the rest of the pictures

were either overexposed,

underexposed, or boring.

I'll tell you,

if it wasn't for the pimento

and onion cheese dip,

none of us would have stayed.

Well, that's too bad, you know,

'cause pictures are expensive.

I remember I paid $12

for my school portrait.

When I got it back,

you should have seen it.

I looked like a geek.

You're kidding me?

No, seriously.

Yeah.

Must have got my bad side.

Yeah, your front.

And I'll tell you,

buster has really lost his mind.

Harold, get this -- he says

he can get all the money back

that he spent on the pictures

by taking silver

out of the negatives --

silver, harold,

like there's silver

in film negatives.

Well, there is.

Huh?

Well, in old film, anyway.

Yeah. It's the silver that

actually forms the picture.

What are you talking about,

harold?

Well, in photographic film,

until recently,

they're used like forms

of silver to take the picture.

It's called silver halides.

Oh, well, sil--

silver halides, yeah.

Well, I knew that silver --

well, I -- he said "silver."

that's all I'm questioning --

you know, the silver.

Yeah. Right.

So, yeah, okay.

All right.

But he says he can get

the silver

out of the silver halides.

Like, good luck, buster.

Well, you know, he can

if he uses the right emulsion.

Well, that's -- yeah.

Well, I did--

well, I don't think

he's got the emul--

see, now, okay. Where did you

get to be such a genius?

Well, I'm not.

Well, you're smarter

than I am.

Oh, yeah, okay.

I'm a genius to you.

Winston rothschild here

for rothschild sewage

and septic sucking services,

where our motto is

"waste not, pump not!"

1-800-555-suck.

Red: We're out here

by the main highway

at humphries everything store

with the man who knows

the value of everything,

dalton humphries.

Hello, dalton.

How you doing?

Yeah, red, I'm just having

a chuckle

at somebody else's expense.

[ chuckles ]

oh, yeah, with that silver cup

there, eh?

No, no. No, no.

This isn't silver. No, no.

This is, uh --

this is polished aluminum.

It doesn't, uh -- it doesn't

have the weight of silver.

Oh. So, that's pretty much

worthless, I guess.

Well, to you, maybe,

but -- but I'm gonna give it

some character here.

There. That's better.

Now, just engrave "baby" on it

or something

and maybe the date 1802,

and, uh, I'll sell it

for 400 bucks to some sucker.

[ laughs ]

that's very commendable.

Uh, dalton, did you know

we got a project going

where we're taking silver

out of film negatives?

Oh, yeah.

You know, there's a better way

to do it than that.

Shouldn't be telling

trade secrets here, but...

Take a look

at this plate here.

Yeah?

You see right around

the edge there,

there's a little beading

of silver

someone's painted on there.

Yeah, uh-huh, uh-huh.

Yeah, well, that's silver.

It's real silver.

Isn't that something?

Wow.

Oh, yeah.

You know,

I got 400 of these plates.

I got them when a, uh, hotel

went out of business,

or maybe it was an asylum

or something.

Anyway, I'm gonna sit down

with a putty knife

for two or three weeks,

chisel all that silver

off the edge,

and when I'm finished, I'm gonna

have a whole bag full of silver.

Whole bag full.

Whole bag.

Oh, boy.

[ spraying ]

you know what I noticed,

uncle red?

Well, guys take

their dates out, you know,

to plays and restaurants

and movies and stuff,

but after they get married,

they hardly ever go out anymore.

I know. That's one

of the main reasons

for getting married,

harold.

Well, if I get married,

I'm gonna take my wife

out on dates all the time

just to show her

that I love her.

I think it'll look more like

gratitude than love, harold.

Just because a couple don't

go out together anymore

doesn't mean

they don't love each other.

They just get busy,

that's all.

Busy?

What could be more important

than spending time

with your sweetheart?

Well, the priorities

of daily living, harold.

Bills to pay,

maybe overtime at the office,

work around the house,

perhaps a sporting event

on television --

that kind of thing.

Well, I just happen

to think

that married spouses

take each other for granted.

Well, harold, you know,

when you spend a lot of time

with somebody,

it doesn't necessarily

make you eager

to spend more time

with them.

You and I

have proven that.

That's different.

We're like, you know, guys,

whereas a guy and a girl,

like, you know...

Wa-a-a!

Yeah, well, there's something

else you should know, harold.

After you get married,

99% of the time,

sleeping together

means sleeping together.

No way!

Wa-a-a!

I'd never be that tired.

Well, maybe not,

but every girl

within 100 miles of you

will be that tired,

believe me.

No problem.

I'll move.

[ explosion ]

so, harold and I had a big day

of relaxing planned,

but, uh, bill had asked us

to come out

and take part

in america's favorite pastime,

which I was disappointed to see

was baseball.

So, anyway,

he had all the gear there,

and he wanted me to go out

and pitch the ball.

Why he handed me a batting

helmet, I couldn't understand,

but with bill, you know,

you're always better to have

some protective gear on.

So, harold's gonna be

the catcher, I guess,

and bill's helping him.

This is helping, I suppose.

Oh, my gosh.

Could be a while, I suppose.

All right.

They got the one leg going.

Now they got the other,

'cause the catcher has to have

the padding on and everything,

but I think maybe harold

might be better on his own.

I guess I've always said that.

You guys gonna be long?

You know, they say

a lot of people

come out to, uh,

see these games.

There we go. All right.

Fine, let's go.

[ clunk ]

play ball. Oh!

How can you have strike one

on you

and the ball

hasn't even been thrown yet?

Yeah, he's fine, bill.

Yeah.

I'm not sure he -- harold.

No, harold. Harold.

Over here.

Here, boy. Here, boy.

There we go. All right.

Finally.

I don't know

whether to give him my knuckler

or my sliding, sinking fastball

or --

what? What? What?

Oh.

Time out.

What's his problem now?

Oh, he doesn't like the bat.

[ clang ]

I don't know why.

Ow! Ow!

All right.

Just pick a bat, bill.

Right now harold and I

are getting a little bored,

having a game of catch.

Well, one of us is.

Oh, man.

All right, bill.

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,

oh, oh, oh, look out!

Oh, oh!

Nice one.

Oh, I see you picked yourself

a bat there, eh, bill?

All right.

Oh, my gosh.

All right.

Here we go.

What? What?

Oh, for gosh sake.

[ vacuum whirs ]

I have nothing to say

about that.

All right.

I'm looking in for my sign.

No, no.

Don't like that one.

No, no, no.

Yes, sir.

That's the one I like.

High heat.

[ whoosh! Clang! ]

I believe you're out

at the plate, sir.

Attaboy, harold.

Nice grip.

That's how that works.

Stay tuned

for some dry-dock poetry,

and then winston tries

to get ahold of a big one.

"April love," by me.

"on a sunny April day,

years ago,

"my mother turned sweet 16,

"and my father met my mother

on another sunny April day.

"and on a third sunny day

in April,

"they first kissed

and fell in love.

"and another April day,

they wed,

"as the sun shone from above.

"and I was born

yet another sunny day in April.

"I'm told that was

one of the few aprils

where we had five sunny days

in a row."

[ rattling ]

well, this idea of getting

silver out of the film negatives

has kind of started a bit of a

gold rush up here at the lodge.

Everybody's going back,

digging up all their old stuff,

throwing it into the pot.

A lot of wedding photos

showing up there.

Except for old man sedgwick,

'cause all his pictures

are painted on cave walls.

I think you guys

should realize, you know,

that getting silver from film

is a very low-yield exercise.

Well, low-yield

is kind of our specialty

up at the lodge here.

Okay, yeah, but there's like a

millionth of a smidge of silver

in each photograph,

you know.

You're gonna need

like 100 rolls of film

just to get 1 ounce of silver.

Wa-a-a!

You know how much

1 ounce of silver's worth?

$6.

You know what 100 rolls

of our film is worth?

Nothing.

Unless maybe we cover them

with molasses

and use them

as fly strips.

Yeah, but what about all the

hours of work you put into it,

the money you spend

on chemicals?

You're no further ahead.

Sure we are, harold.

We're learning something,

we're having fun,

and, most importantly, we're not

out in our cars or our boats

where we do

the real expensive damage.

[ chuckles ]

you guys have a very warped

sense of economy.

Well, harold, when you get to

our age, you give up on winning.

You just try to lose

as slowly as possible.

Well, all this talk of

silver stocks and profit margins

has got our heads spinning,

so I thought we'd get

some sound business advice

from winston rothschild,

'cause when winston talks,

people back off.

Well, if it isn't

red, the silver fox.

Hey, winston.

How's business?

It sucks.

Sorry to hear that.

No, no, it's a joke.

"it sucks." you know?

Oh. [ chuckles ]

hose, septic, sucks.

Yeah.

Listen, I got some film here

for you if you want to buy it.

Well, uh, all right.

I'm surprised you want to part

with these family mementos.

Um [clears throat]

actually, they're --

they're recent pictures

of my old man.

I need to tell you

the truth.

Uh, you'd be doing him a favor,

red, 'cause most of them

could be used against him

in a court of law.

Oh, sure. Yeah.

So, winston, do you have

any business advice for us

on this deal?

Red, you got to follow

your heart, all right?

Follow your heart.

You know, if you feel strongly

about this silver project,

I say go for it, eh?

Okay.

Like, you're not in it

for just the money, are you?

Not so far.

There you go.

Yeah.

[ slurping ]

boy, I'll tell you,

I've done a lot of crazy things

in the early years myself, eh?

Like for instance,

once I started out

this whole mail-order thing,

but then some idiot

broke the chain

and never sent a dollar

to seven of his friends, eh?

And then I got

into this pyramid scheme,

which quickly collapsed

into a rhomboid.

Boy, I lost my shirt

on that one.

And then I started selling seeds

and greeting cards,

but, uh, the prizes were never

as good as they looked

on the back

of the comic books, eh?

Oh, I've been there.

But you know what?

Then I found something

that I was good at

and I really enjoyed.

Well, why are you

in the sewage business?

Oh, no, that's what

I'm talking about, eh?

Oh, oh.

This is what I like most

in life.

Wow.

Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!

Whoa! Whoa!

Whoa! Whoa!

Boy, that was

a double flusher.

Whew!

So, I don't know.

Maybe, uh -- you know,

maybe the silver escapade, uh,

could be, you know, if you're

lucky, your sewage plan.

Yeah, that wouldn't

surprise me.

I hear the distant sound of

everything going down the drain.

[ creaking ]

well, this getting the silver

out of the film negatives

started off

a little bit slow,

but then we got kind of an

assembly-line thing going there.

Buster hadfield

would unroll the film.

Moose would get the emulsion off

with a belt sander.

And then, uh, junior singleton

would suck it up with a vacuum.

And then I would dissolve

the dust into vinegar.

And then old man sedgwick got

the silver out of the vinegar

by using electricity

hooked up to his pacemaker.

I'll tell you, there can't be

one good roll of film left

in all of possum county.

Moose even donated

all the mug shots

he's had done over the years.

And how many ingots of silver

did you get

with all your effort?

One tiny, little blob,

harold,

about the size

of your brain.

Wa-a-a!

Well, well, well, well, well,

good business move, uncle red.

You go to cash that in,

you'll find you probably worked

for about, oh, 2 cents a day.

Wa-a-a!

Which, come to think of it, is

probably all your time is worth.

Well, we're not gonna cash it in

for a while, harold.

We're gonna hang on to it

until silver goes up

enough in value

that we can make money

on this.

Well, I don't think

the planet earth's

gonna be around that long.

Oh, sure it will, harold.

The big question is,

who do we trust to hang on to

the silver while we're waiting?

So we took a page out

of the lone ranger's book.

We melted her down

into a bullet.

We went down

and fired her

into the dead tree in the center

of the town park.

Which tree?

The silver birch.

We're not stupid, harold.

[ chuckles ] oh, no.

No, no, no, no.

[ screeching ]

oh, that's the cry

of the possum.

It's meeting time,

kemo sabe.

[ chuckles ]

well, I'd call him "tonto,"

but he's more like toto.

I'll be down in a while,

harold.

If my wife is watching,

I'll be coming straight home

after the meeting,

and if you're wondering

what I got your sister

for her silver anniversary,

tell her it's in the park.

And to the rest of you,

thanks so much for watching,

and until next time,

on behalf of myself and harold

and the whole gang

up here at possum lodge,

keep your stick on the ice.

[ screeching ]

[ indistinct conversations ]

okay, everybody rise up.

Stand up, baby.

All:

Quando omni flunkus, moritati.

Now, fellas...

If you'd like to become a member

of possum lodge

and you got three bucks to blow,

you can either mail it to

the address here on the screen

or dial 1-800-ypossum.